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connieaw's review against another edition
5.0
This cookbook has a TON of wonderful recipes in it. I checked it out from the library but I'm going to have to purchase a copy for my home.
mlindner's review against another edition
Sara brought home. Found a couple recipes to perhaps try.
alexiconeternal's review
1.0
As an avid Instant Pot user and ketoer of two years, I really wanted this to be good. I went through every recipe in this book and tried a few that stood out. Given the price, I almost wanted to gloss over the glaring issues with this and justify my spending so much for it. Unfortunately, I can't.
First of all, this book badly needed an editor. Missing page titles, recipes referenced that have placeholder page numbers, and inaccurate macros are pretty inexcusable. The roasted garlic macros alone are so wildly off that it's almost insulting, and that's for something that's easy to check. The inaccuracies in this make relying on the author difficult. And why should anyone trust their health and food to someone who can't hire someone to edit their 35 dollar picture book?
Before I even got to any of that, I had to read the introduction. She mentioned her PCOS, but after that it was going into the details of her husband's multiple job losses, how they subsequently lived (which, spoiler alert, wasn't that bad), and then his myriad of health problems. She went into the details of his medical issues. She talked about his personal and emotional insecurities. Then she dedicided to juxtapose that by talking about how successful she personally is now. It's gross. It's embarrassing. I felt deeply uncomfortable for him, watching something vulnerable about another human being being exposed by the person who is supposed to be on their side. Why was this even talked about in a cookbook?
The most valuable part of this book is after the introduction and before the recipes, where she talks about how to use the Instant Pot. Unfortunately, it isn't enough to make the book purchase worth it; you can get all this information online pretty easily.
The recipes are, on the whole, pretty useless. If you're looking for healthy food that's easy, uncomplicated, and tasty, you will not find it in this book. The very first recipe calls for so much artificial sweetener that it's truly nauseating. The "keto rice" is literally scrambled eggs. And take it from me, unless there's a lot of liquid in the recipe, don't use it. I now know with disgusting clarity exactly what scorched mayonnaise smells like because I trusted this author against my better judgment. Further, many recipes don't have accurate cook times, so always check your meat with a thermometer to ensure it was properly cooked.
A lot of recipes felt like they were meant for the stove and oven. But "Instant Pot" is a buzz word, so they put the square peg of a recipe into a round hole that is pressure cooking. And what do you get? Recipes that have you moving multiple stages of a dish in and out of one giant pot not designed for that purpose, sometimes not even using the pressure cook option much at all. They become unnecessarily complicated and messy. They take away the purpose of this device: making cooking easier.
Should I even get into the ginger ale that has over a third of a cup of chemical sweetener per serving? Or any other odd and bizarre things that happened in these pages? It was exhausting to read, and it's getting tiring to keep writing and thinking about it.
So keto and/or Instant Pot newbies, here's my advice:
Find a good site that tells you basic cook times for foods in your pressure cooker. Cook the meat in there, and while it's doing that, throw some veggies on the stove or in the oven. Variations of that make dinner and leftovers simple. Once you've got a feel for your cooker, you can try more ambitious recipes. But realistically? I wouldn't try them from this book.
Your mileage may vary. But this veteran is going to take a hard pass on this and any other future books by this author.
First of all, this book badly needed an editor. Missing page titles, recipes referenced that have placeholder page numbers, and inaccurate macros are pretty inexcusable. The roasted garlic macros alone are so wildly off that it's almost insulting, and that's for something that's easy to check. The inaccuracies in this make relying on the author difficult. And why should anyone trust their health and food to someone who can't hire someone to edit their 35 dollar picture book?
Before I even got to any of that, I had to read the introduction. She mentioned her PCOS, but after that it was going into the details of her husband's multiple job losses, how they subsequently lived (which, spoiler alert, wasn't that bad), and then his myriad of health problems. She went into the details of his medical issues. She talked about his personal and emotional insecurities. Then she dedicided to juxtapose that by talking about how successful she personally is now. It's gross. It's embarrassing. I felt deeply uncomfortable for him, watching something vulnerable about another human being being exposed by the person who is supposed to be on their side. Why was this even talked about in a cookbook?
The most valuable part of this book is after the introduction and before the recipes, where she talks about how to use the Instant Pot. Unfortunately, it isn't enough to make the book purchase worth it; you can get all this information online pretty easily.
The recipes are, on the whole, pretty useless. If you're looking for healthy food that's easy, uncomplicated, and tasty, you will not find it in this book. The very first recipe calls for so much artificial sweetener that it's truly nauseating. The "keto rice" is literally scrambled eggs. And take it from me, unless there's a lot of liquid in the recipe, don't use it. I now know with disgusting clarity exactly what scorched mayonnaise smells like because I trusted this author against my better judgment. Further, many recipes don't have accurate cook times, so always check your meat with a thermometer to ensure it was properly cooked.
A lot of recipes felt like they were meant for the stove and oven. But "Instant Pot" is a buzz word, so they put the square peg of a recipe into a round hole that is pressure cooking. And what do you get? Recipes that have you moving multiple stages of a dish in and out of one giant pot not designed for that purpose, sometimes not even using the pressure cook option much at all. They become unnecessarily complicated and messy. They take away the purpose of this device: making cooking easier.
Should I even get into the ginger ale that has over a third of a cup of chemical sweetener per serving? Or any other odd and bizarre things that happened in these pages? It was exhausting to read, and it's getting tiring to keep writing and thinking about it.
So keto and/or Instant Pot newbies, here's my advice:
Find a good site that tells you basic cook times for foods in your pressure cooker. Cook the meat in there, and while it's doing that, throw some veggies on the stove or in the oven. Variations of that make dinner and leftovers simple. Once you've got a feel for your cooker, you can try more ambitious recipes. But realistically? I wouldn't try them from this book.
Your mileage may vary. But this veteran is going to take a hard pass on this and any other future books by this author.
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